


We are ignored

by orphan_account



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Canon Compliant, Character Study, Gen, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Retelling, Slav Mythology - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-18
Updated: 2013-12-18
Packaged: 2018-01-05 02:28:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1088519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>"“Do you even have a heart?” He asked, voice trembling. The other only laughed.</em>
  <br/>
  <em>“Soon I won’t have, but don’t you worry about it.” He said, then picked up his headdress from the bed and a still burning fag from the ground and left.</em>
  <br/>
  <em>The Man In The Tan Jacket didn’t understand anything at all."</em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Soon he will, standing under a massive monument half-covered by sand.</p>
            </blockquote>





	We are ignored

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'ed. I don't feel exactly good with this work but I want to continue with this one and finish it because I adore those two too much.

_“Gemini: You’ll meet someone today who will have no effect on your life and who you will immediately forget. Retain hope for a possible future.” –_ Cecil in History Week

No one noticed him. At least, he hoped so.

He didn’t notice bloodied blue eyes regarding him from behind a trashcan. He didn’t notice a sickly purple hand covered in green tendrils catching one of his flies and those eyes staring at it thoughtfully for few minutes before releasing it.

 

 

He saw him for the first time in the middle of a night, when he appeared in Night Vale.

His first thought was that he looked ridiculous in that headdress. Next one was wonder why this man was here, outside Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex, sitting on a hood of an old Honda Accord at 4am in the morning. His eyes were fixed on doors leading to a building, as if expecting that something will emerge from them in any given moment. Still, the man wasn’t looking at him, so it was alright, as it should be.

But then those brown eyes moved and, strangely enough, fixed in one place. They weren’t wandering over ever-changing features, their gaze was steely and sure and those black irises almost burned his own, so unused to other’s stare. Before he could vanish or try to influence this man, he raised his voice.

“You were there before.”

They stared at each other for a long moment.  The Man in the Tan Jacket sighed and came a bit closer to a stranger and, in perfect Russian he formed a question.

“How come you have noticed me?” He asked. Stranger must have heard a sound of leather moving as The Man’s gloved grip tightened on handle of his deerskin suitcase for his hand moved closer to his hip, less of a source of a support but ready to take whatever form of action to defend or attack… but a corner of his mouth twitched, as if to form a smirk. “And what are you doing so late at night anyway?”

“We all have our secrets, don’t we?” He hopped off his car, hand gripping that awful Indian headdress so it won’t fall from his head. Feathers shined in a faint light of streetlamps. Plastic.

“And that thing on your head is also a secret?” The Man asked half-jokingly. Even if a guy was a Native American, well, this thing wasn’t even trying to hide that he bought it in some kind of souvenir shop or wherever those kind of atrocities are bought in.

“That thing is what keeps Sheriff’s Secret Police and entire town away from me.” A shrug. “After all, I am a ‘racist jerk’, right?” He drew quotation marks in air with his fingers. The Man noticed a scar on his wrist, it was thick, looked as if this hand was cut away and then somehow sewn back to its…

Stranger noticed his stare and hid a hand behind his back, something close to annoyance crossing his face.

“Anyway… I can sit here and wait in peace.” He said, then he sat back on a hood of his car. “You can wait with me, if you want to. I don’t think you need sleep anyway.”

The Man regarded him for few moments before sitting next to him. Strange guy, but The Man had to wait until the morning and, well, who knows, maybe time will pass faster in this weird company. Plus… There was something strange about this man. Some kind of strange energy surrounded him, something he never encountered in his very long life and The Man had a strange feeling it was somehow connected to amount of knowledge this man could possibly possess. And, he could see The Man. That itself was suspicious enough.

“And you don’t need to sleep by any chance?”

Stranger let out a short laugh that ended as quickly as it has started. In a silence he regarded the entrance to Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex.

“I’ll have time for that later. A lot of time.”

 

 

It was obvious The Apache Tracker, as it turned out the guy was called by the entire town, didn’t have home anymore. The Man in The Tan Jacket tried to visit him one day only to discover it wasn’t where it should be. It wasn’t there at all. Instead he found a little square covered in grass, a tiny meadow that somehow everybody avoided – along with The Man and The Tracker.

It happened that on his previous visit in Night Vale The Man bought himself a little home – he knew he had to come here sooner or later and he always felt better when he was prepared for everything that was thrown at him. He could see Larry Leeroy’s house on the edge of town through the window.

So The Man invited The Tracker in. His house wasn’t big but there was a sofa for The Tracker and a bed for The Man and there was no Faceless Old Woman to set their fridges on fire – first of all, Faceless Old Woman was avoiding The Apache Tracker and The Man didn’t have fridge anyway. He burned it himself.

It took them less than a week to get used to each other. They rarely met inside a house and even when, they just passed by, exchanging glances and sometimes even greetings. Each had own businesses to attend. Often they left notes on a table in a kitchen, such as “Won’t be home for dinner so don’t bother. Don’t enter the garden, I haven’t finished digging.“, “I’ve found a fly in my morning coffee. It’s alive, I’ve left it in your bedroom on a platter with sugar.”, “Don’t wear this thing on your head in house, I found a feather in a washing machine.” and “Could you get rid of that spider under a sofa? It’s eating away my flies.”, all written in neat Cyrillic.

 

 

The Man in The Tan Jacket revealed himself to the city soon after and he was quite happy that The Apache Tracker was with him – he successfully kept Sheriff’s Secret Police’s pawns and Night Vale Community Radio Host’s eye away from his – their – home by sheer presence.

“So what about this outsider?” The Tracker asked one evening, cup of tea made of two tea-bags in one hand and a toast with some cheese in the other.

It was one of those calm evenings on Wednesdays they spent on a sofa, a headdress and a jacket hanging in a hallway, both men almost painfully casual. The Man wondered how exactly everything came to this, after barely two months, that he felt so comfortable next to The Tracker. He stared at his own sandwich, this one with ham and, after a second of thought, he put ham away and started to nibble on a toast. Ham will be useful later, to catch flies.

“Human. No supernatural abilities, no curses or blessings… A scientist who has all the knowledge he absorbed and that’s all.” He shrugged and The Tracker raised an eyebrow at him. “I have no idea why exactly the Host would be interested in him.”

“According to human standards he _is_ handsome.” The Tracker grinned and The Man noticed a bread crumble stuck to one of his gums. “Although when you consider Host’s nature it’s not exactly a valid argument, is it?”

“Not really.” He murmured, eyes fixed on a screen. Some kind of weird movie about a man living in a strange houses that moved on their own across deserts made of transparent material that was almost like sand but less solid, fascinating thing. “Although do you have to be human to be attracted to one?”

“How should I know? I’m human.” Again, The Tracker grinned. “You’re the one to talk.”

“I think _you_ are attractive.” There was no embarrassment like in one of those movies that he once brought from a shop and, after watching those, both decided to throw them away. After relishing their frustrations on CDs, they had form of gray dust. The Tracker smiled into his mug and looked up at The Man.

“This was nice.” He said after putting empty mug aside. “And only proves that everything’s fine when it comes to those two. Nothing to be worried about.”

“You’re not exactly a ‘normal human’ though, are you?”

A smile disappeared from The Tracker’s lips in a second after a question left The Man’s lips. The Man felt something unpleasant rise in his guts and he wanted to say something, anything. Many times before he tried to breach a subject of nature or source of The Tracker’s powers but whenever he tried he was cut short or subject was quickly changed.

“I am.” He answered, his face too still and neutral for The Man to consider the reply as a truth. The Tracker got up and went upstairs and The Man heard door to his bedroom shut with a loud slam. He sighed quietly and covered himself with a blanket after turning off the TV.

 

 

In the morning The Man went upstairs. He noticed that this awful headdress disappeared from the rack in a hallway, so he assumed The Tracker left The Man’s bedroom. So he calmly went upstairs, taking his clothes from living room – no sane person who was wearing clothing rested while fully clothed, this was logical.

Except The Apache Tracker, of course. He was only in t-shirt and boxers but his headdress was sitting proudly on his head and The Tracker himself was sitting equally proudly on The Man’s bad, cigarette in one hand and a book in the other. Book was wrapped in an old newspaper, so he couldn’t see a title but it didn’t matter.

The Man In The Tan Jacket felt something on his face twitch.

“What are you doing?” He asked, struggling to keep his voice as calm as possible. Which was hard. There were tiny burnt holes visible on a blanket, probably result of smoking a cigarette without a cigarette tray. A very deliberate smoking.

“Pissing you off.” Replied the Tracker, turning another page of a book. He didn’t even raise his eyes to acknowledge a presence of  the Man.

“And you have nothing better to do now, do you?” He strode closer to The Tracker and before he could even react, snatched the cigarette out of his hand. The Tracker blinked, took a bookmark that was lying on his stomach and delicately put it between browning pages. He put the book away and finally, finally! raised his head to look up at The Man.

“Not at the moment, no. Why do you ask?” Those brown eyes were faking innocence but lips were slightly curled, just a hint of teeth visible between them.  And The Man was pissed off.

He grabbed front of The Tracker’s shirt, lifting him up and throwing him easily across the room. Not a single sound left his throat as his back hit the wall and slid down it, body limp because of sheer force and shock that for few second paralyzed his body, but that wasn’t important. All rage left The Man’s body when he noticed a green tendril on The Tracker’s body when his shirt uncovered a bit of a skin on his stomach. The Tracker noticed what he was looking at and quickly snatched material down, hiding it. The Man took a step back.

“You are cursed.” He spat out, voice trembling. He had no idea what it was but he saw enough. Under this black shirt with a picture of something resembling a hybrid of a dinosaur and a cow were thick, green tendrils, half-buried into the surface of dark skin.

“No, not really.” The Tracker spat out. His voice was rasped, as if he needed to struggle to keep it relatively calm. “But I hope you don’t mind, E███t.”

“How…” The Man didn’t even know how to react. How? How this little man, cursed or not, this mortal, this human knew about his name? How? How come he revealed it? Has he revealed it to other’s? How he managed to possess this knowledge? How? He felt something snap, deep inside and he attacked The Tracker, but this time he was prepared, catching indescribable wrists and throwing The Man onto a bed.

“I am special like that.” The Tracker murmured, checking the headdress and the swiftly covering lying body with his own, immobilizing The Man’s wrists and legs. “Covered in plants and annoying, but I thought you’d know about other part already.”

“I didn’t knew that you were _that_ annoying.” The Man managed to free himself from under the other’s body, managing to pin him down. He grasped his jaw, forced The Tracker to look into his eyes – he knew where his eyes were, he knew and should be enough to arouse anyone’s suspicion but The Man was blind, too blind. He got used to good company, annoying but good company and those are the results.

“Tell me. _How?!_ ” He almost yelled out the question, fingers digging into bones of The Tracker’s jaw. “ _How?_ ”

“By accident, moron.” He answered, struggling to form words with his head immobilized like that. “On a post office they had a list of future residents, and there you were, among other people.”

This weird explanation made sense, strangely enough. The Tracker rarely mentioned anything about his past but the Night Vale Post Office often appeared.

“And this plant? Growing on your body?” He demanded, moving one head from The Tracker’s wrist under his shirt, uncovering more of his body to see those clearer. Dark-green, thick, curling around, forming harsh spirals, a messy patter only plant could master. Tendrils turned into leafs and then he uncovered The Tracker’s chest and he couldn’t help but recoil.

Tendrils sunk into the skin, in exact place where The Tracker’s heart was and The Man was pretty sure that they resurfaced on the other side, on the back. A hole.

Sheer amount of tendrils made The Man wonder if The Tracker had heart at all.

“You are straddling my hips and stripping me and I feel slightly uncomfortable, so could you stop?” The Man only now looked at The Tracker’s face. His eyes were terrifyingly neutral, lips tight, eyes blank.

The Man wordlessly let go of a Tracker, and he immediately covered his chest. He looked at The Man, as if waiting for something. A question.

“Do you even have a heart?” He asked, voice trembling. The other only laughed.

“Soon I won’t have, but don’t you worry about it.” The Apache Tracker said, then picked up his headdress from the bed and a still burning fag from the floor and left.

 

The Man In The Tan Jacket didn’t understand anything at all. 

**Author's Note:**

> I feel awful with asking you for comments, but I am doing this right now: please, comment on this fic. I don't exactly feel sure with what I did here - plus I want to make this story as canon-compliant as only it is possible, so any observations are A+. I am trying to notice as many things while listening to episodes as I can but it doesn't always work.  
> People might feel uncomfortable with this work since I am writing about The Apache Tracker and his status in the fandom is what it is. So... If you hate The Apache Tracker you can leave. This work might bother you.  
> Also - I will make strong connections between The Apache Tracker's potential power and Slav legends, because why the hell not.  
> Thank you for reading and I hope you will enjoy this story as it continues.


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